How Do We Get Board Room Attention For Our Corporate Sustainability Efforts? And Help Directors Understand and Support The Corporate Effort?

Those questions and more are often raised by managers trying to get the board room and C-suite attention – and support and resources needed — to launch or advance their company’s sustainability journey.

Here at G&A Institute our team has ongoing conversations with corporate managers about ESG / corporate sustainability and related topics. What often comes up: the “G” is challenging. The questions raised include…

What metrics can we apply to show “governance progress” in our reporting? Governance – that’s clearly a board room responsibility. What is measurable…and then reportable to be part of the ESG profile of the company?

How can we get the board’s attention to be able to keep them updated and involved in our company’s sustainability efforts?

If we are staring out, how can we get the board’s attention to be able to help them understand the importance of corporate sustainability (we hear this from managers trying to get the program going and needing resources to be allocated).

Some answers to these and other questions are at hand in the advice from the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (the WBCSD) in the form of a commentary by the organization’s associate of redefining value, Johanna Tahtinen. She offers perspectives and advice on Ethical Corporation’s platform.

To move from “nice to have” to “need to have”, she cites a McKinsey & Company report that found that a quarter of assets under management (globally) are now invested considering ESG factors, and what was a niche practice is now large and fast-growing. Good for the board to know.

And, the World Economic Forum (WEF), the Davos meetings organizer, in its third Global Risk Report identified ESG as “…clearly becoming part of the everyday business realty and well as a fiduciary duty. Good for the board to consider.

Governance metrics are a starting point and focus area for many investors, creating expectations for companies to integrate ESG “meaningfully into governance structures, management processes and disclosure”. Clearly in the board room list of duties and responsibilities to address.

The influential WBCSD, Johanna Tahtinen explains, recently launched a project on governance and oversight to elevate ESG-related issues to the board room by supporting stronger decision-making, risk management and business resilience.

Good governance – assuring that this a high-priority in the board room – sends strong signals to the capital markets. How do we know that?

A recent study by WBCSD and Big 4 accounting firm PwC shows that investors (generally) have more confidence in the information reported and that governance metrics are a starting point and focus area for many investors today.

For the board room audience — the report put ESG in the risk category — it is all about risk, said Paula Loop, Leader-Governance Insights Center at PwC. She talked in February 2019 about risks, common misperceptions and the three stages of ESG with FEI Daily (the publication of Financial Executives International).